Category: About my Home

Home is where you feel it is. Currently I live in Austria and this is home. When go to visit my hometown Berlin, where I was raised, I am at home as well. I wonder what I will call home next? Find out about it!

I love to do sessions where I get the opportunity to document pros at work. A recent night spent with two lovely nurses brought up some cool insights into worklife at the clinic. There’s more to come, but those are the first impressions for you. Pretty cool, right?

Workflow Photography in the Hospital of Innsbruck, Austria. Medicinal care in pictures

Workflow Photography in the Hospital of Innsbruck, Austria. Medicinal care in pictures

Workflow Photography in the Hospital of Innsbruck, Austria. Medicinal care in pictures

Workflow Photography in the Hospital of Innsbruck, Austria. Medicinal care in pictures

Summer, best time of the year to go outdoors with your model. We had a lot of fun, taking a session in traditional clothes for the topic Fashion found in the tradition and at the countryside of Austria. Photos were taken with Nikon FX D750 camera and Nikon 50mm f1.8 manual objective at f2.8 to 5.6. You can find them via the gallery and on BeNicoMa Stock Photography.

The Nordkette Wetterleuchten Festival is a cosy open air on Seegrube (1905 m) over Innsbruck. You get two days of electronic sounds, served with THE VIEW, down to city and far into the Alps at night. A truly amazing experience!

This year’s Alps Festival Wetterleuchten has been stunning! The weather was stable and actually perfect, with true Wetterleuchten – thunderstorms seen from the distance – over other regions of the Alps.

Overlooking the festivities of the Nordkette Wetterleuchten Eletronic Music Festival over Innsbruck, Austria

There have been two tents with great, bassy electronic beats, in the bigger tent mashed up with some classics from time to time. Sound was great and dancing actually lots of fun! Everywhere you go up there, you find the tents of the people who stay there over-night. A mild night with around 18 °C on 1905 m, pretty warm and comfortable.

Chillout at the campfireThe big campfire, chillout and warm-up while the bass vibrates in ears and body.

People are in a good mood, but many decide to take the cable car home before 3 A.M. I sit down at the campfire for a while, get back to dancing and decide to leave with the last cable car at 3 A.M. as well. It takes me another hour to get home, but the walk was worth it. To be continued…

A closeup of Innsbruck never hurts. I love the mood up there and it makes this city unique!

The whole festival at a glance. You can see some of the tents in the middle, great place to sleep.

The small Festival Tent with hard beats

The View over Innsbruck

Chillout at the campfire

The cablecar, which guarantees our enjoyment summer and winter

The big campfire, chill and warm-up while the bass vibrates in ears and body.

The View and the tents of campers

The tent and party folks again. I will show you the big tent soon as well

Overlooking the festivities of the Nordkette Wetterleuchten Eletronic Music Festival over Innsbruck, Austria

I want to wish a Merry Christmas to everyone reading this blog! The most valuable institution in our life is our family. This is why I dedicate this entry to my family and its history that nothing will be forgotten and the history can be passed on.

I want to wish a Merry Christmas to everyone reading this blog – or in German Frohe Weihnachten! The most valuable institution in our life is our family. This is why I dedicate this entry to my family and its history!

Merry Christmas to all of you who follow the entries on BeNicoMa.com and many thanks for your support, I am glad to have you here and wish you peaceful Christmas holidays!

Many conflicts divide our society, the different peoples of the world and the family as an institution suffer from restrictions, which are caused by our economic interests and the pressure, built up by our society… This should not be the case since the family is the only institution in life, that is not exchangeable and if you are peaceful and in harmony with the ones you are related to, everything is so much better.

With this entry I want to remember my grandparents, who both were Chinese, coming a long way during the time of Nazi Germany. This entry is dedicated to all relatives, as a source of history that our ancestors may not be forgotten …

The inner family on a glance: Madga with Teh Wei on her lap, besides my father Teh Li, Teh Dscheng (Ted), Teh Ko and Teh Hsing – from left to right. In the back is my grandfather Ting Sheng. The picture is from 1944 or 1945, and was taken in Germany.

The name of my grandmother, Chao TiLing (that is her maiden name) and later Ma, means as much as “Call me the little brother” since Madga (mother) as we used to call her, was born into the Chinese part of my family solely with sisters. The name implies the wish for a son. She was from Wenzhou in China and was born in 1916.

Chao Ti Ling, with 16 years in China – We just called her Madga. For what she achieved in those tough times, she is one of my alltime idols, may she rest in peace!

My grandfather Ting Sheng Ma was merchant and much older than her. He was born in 1898 in the region Chekiang (Zhejiang) in China but I couldn’t get more detailed information about him from my uncle. Here you see some pictures of family members from China but my uncle Teh Ko couldn’t provide more information about them since he doesn’t know better. The pictures are all what is left as a connect to the Chinese background of the family in China and albeit from him, nobody speaks Chinese anymore, which is a pity.

I use the Chinese letter for Ma as signum for my photography and in future I will apply it as a seal in all official purposes.

Our last name Ma is written like depicted here and the meaning is “Hemp plant under the firmament“, if you translate it into a western meaning. The name is rare in the meanwhile, since most Ma‘s are derived from the meaning horse. We don’t know much about our family background in China. My grandparents came alone in 1933, when my grandmother was 17 years old. They came with the Transsiberian train, via Russia, to Dingen in Poland as their first home in Europe. I could not find the Polish name for it nowadays but have the names of the other cities where my family lived in those times. They moved several times in between Germany and Poland.

All my uncles were born in Europe. My grandparents moved from their first destination Dingen to Łódź– which was called Litzmannstadt by that time. In Łódź, which belongs to Poland again after the end of WWII, my uncles Teh Ko (1935) and Teh Hsing (1937) were born. Most of the provided information was given to me by Teh Ko, who remembers lots of details, despite his age. Teh Tscheng (1939) – who was just called Ted later, because he moved to Canada to found his own family – was born in Poland as well. The family wanted to return to China in 1939 due to the ongoing and developing war on the countryside in the East. My grandfather was quite successful with trading by that time but the Germans took everything, which made their return impossible. A relatively big Chinese community lived in the Łódź area and many of them returned to China if somehow possible. In 1939/40 the family moved to Berlin. Their first home in Berlin was in Wallner Theaterstrasse 26, in district C2 in 1940. My father Teh Li was born in Charité in 1942.

Madga in Germany, before the times of color photography

In the winter of 1942/43 the bombings of Berlin started and Teh Ko remembers that they have been heavy. He remembers that the windows were clotted and covered with paper everywhere to prevent the breaking glass, due to the bombings, from scattering as dangerous slivers. He also remembers, that he was once hit at the leg by a shrapnel while leaving the bunker. In general he reports that they had relatively few problems with the Nazis. The only thing he mentioned was, that my grandfather should get retracted by the Nazis to fight for the Wehrmacht in 1942/43 – In contrast my father and my Canadian cousin Oliver claim, that my grandfather was forced to leave for compulsory labor in a camp but Madga prevented his vitiation by arguing with the Nazis how she should be able to feed and raise four boys without a father, that’s what she said herself. Maybe the truth is somewhere in between… It will be tough to reproduce the true happenings.

Due to the massive bombings families with many children were evacuated to the countryside – as Teh Ko states on a tractor – in the year 1944 and in a measure called “Storch“. They were moved to Dahlhausen in Brandenburg, about 110 km North-East of Berlin, close to Wittstock / Dosse, and lived initially in the house of Pastor Schmidt in the year of 1944. They were looted again, this time of the Russian red army, although the grandfather had buried everything. On the countryside they were shifted several times and in the same year 1944 my youngest uncle Teh Wei was born in Kutno, which was called Schröttersburg by that time and was part of Schlesien, but belongs to Poland again today.

On this picture are Teh Hsing, Teh Tscheng, Teh Li, Madga and Teh Ko from left to right and some unknown friends of the family.

After the war in 1945/46 the family returned to Berlin and lived in the Auguste-Viktoria-Strasse in Berlin-Grunewald. The children received Chinese lessons from their private teacher Gau Guan Shi. My grandfather didn’t return with the family, he traded with slippers in Poznan (Posen) of Poland, where he lived and worked in Loketka 26 to support the family, and while in Berlin, he carried luggage and traded carpets and china porcelain together with Teh Ko. The both were hawking, traded in the streets and in restaurants, my grandmother took care of the children by that time and the family did alright – both, my uncle and my father confirmed that, independently from each other.

In 1947 my grandfather moved to Frankfurt / Main and Teh Ko followed him in 1949, while the rest of the family remained in Berlin. In 1961 Madga opened the first Chinese restaurant in Müllerstrasse, Berlin-Wedding. Another business of hers was a shop for Chinese wares in Hauptstrasse, Berlin-Schöneberg…

To be continued!

If anyone can and wants to contribute to add to the puzzle of family history, please contact me via my contact form. The attached gallery shows different members of the family and the names and relations to me are given as far as I know. The idea and task to create this entry was granted to me by my cousins Oliver Ma from Canada. I met him, his sister Stephani Ma, and my little cousins Savanna and Etienne, his kids for the first time (that I remember) in 2013, during my Eastcoast Roadtrip. An awesome experience and we will see each other again! I wish happy Christmas Holidays to everyone and hope to be able to gather some more info during the time. Take care!

Me… very young

Oliver, Madga and Nathalie

Ted with Oliver?

My dad, Teh Li and me

Ted

Madga and some German friends

Madga and four of the five

Madga and me

Me, Savanna and Etienne

Chao Ti Ling, with 16 years in China – We just called her Madga

Etienne, Oliver and Savanna

Teh Li, Teh Hsing, Ted and Teh Wei

Stephanie, Oliver, Savanna, Etienne and me

Madga

Oliver, his mum and Ted

Madga

Madga and Nathalie, my older half-sister

Teh Wei and Ted

The family meeting in the 70’s

Oliver visits in the 70’s

Madga and me

The whole family

Madga in Germany

Madga and me

Family gathering

Impressions from China?

Teh Ko and Madga

Marriage of my parents

Probably short after WWII

Canadian Thanksgiving on 10/13/2013 with Elysee, Olivers wife, mum of the kids

The re-unification of Germany is the glorious history of November 9th in German History. There have been different times at this date, but today this entry brings some impressions from my childhood in West-Berlin, some thoughts and of course photography of the 25th anniversary celebrations.

“I’m a child of an island in the red sea.” That’s what I always stated, when we had discussions about East vs West in the past. This is a long topic and the re-unification was not always as smooth as it might seem to you.

We had many discussions with our East German counterparts, because we – from the West – had everything and were arrogant – from the point of view of East Germans. Heard that the last time, when the East Germans behaved exactly like that, getting everything we prepared as group work and being arrogant when questioned for doing so in the studies of Pharmacy in Berlin – “Now it’s our turn, you had everything, all the years before” was the unacceptable answer. Maybe they have been right, but it was not my fault or the fault of my colleagues from the West, we have been small children by that time. That’s already nearly ten years in the past – and the sad thing about it is, that all the glory of a moment and all the hope and good will is replaced by routine – getting back to the routes, forgetting what was important, all too fast.

Today it’s hard to distinct who is East and who is West German – it does not matter anymore or the importance vanishes more and more, at least in my generation. It’s good like that, we are one people.

“I’m a child from an island in the Red Sea.”

By employing this phrase I stated, that I am from West-Berlin, I was born and raised there. Former West-Berlin to be adequate. The place in Germany which was surrounded by the soviet occupancy – the red and since it was a big area surrounding West-Berlin the metaphor “Island in the Red Sea” made sense to me. The DDR (GDR, i.e. German Democratic Republic) was under Russian patronage, but still controlled by their own East German people – the secretary general and his executive the VoPos (Volkspolizei, i.e. peoples police). West-Berlin was a spot of Western life in the middle of the communistic driven DDR – connected to East-Berlin via closed bridges everywhere, with the most prominent Oberbaumbrücke, Bornholmer Brücke in the inner city and Glienicker Brücke towards Brandenburg – those are bridges over the rivers Spree and Havel.

I come from the former British sector, from Berlin-Wilmersdorf. I still remember radio stations like RIAS which means Radio In the American Sector. I still know the surveillance station on Teufelsberg as a guarded stronghold of the American – or allied – forces. I know the term “Rosinenbomber” and connected to that, the importance of the Airport Berlin-Tempelhof, which was the only airport in the beginning, right after the wall was built in August 1961, to bring supplies and food to West-Berlin. Visit the memorial park while you are in Berlin, Checkpoint Charlie and Brandenburger Tor, to see the most popular places, where the separation was obviously visible – and Eastside Gallery to see authentic left overs of the Berlin Wall.

While for us in West-Berlin traveling was possible during the whole time, it was not as comfortable as today. We had to pass the DDR, on the corridors that were open to the West-Berliners and Western Germans to enter Berlin. This act – yes it was! – was called Transit. You had to wait at the border leaving West-Berlin and again at the border to enter BRD, or Western Germany, as it was called in the past. And this Transit was not always smooth, some days you had to wait hours to be allowed to reenter or they didn’t let you at all. I remember one night in winter, when I was a small kid. We have not been allowed to enter BRD and had to wait at the border for ten hours, before it was reopened. The allied forces handed soup and sheets for the people waiting and the VoPos checked every car with dogs for fleeing people. That was reality and I still have this image on my mind of soldiers digging our luggage, a submachine gun over the shoulder, the dogs in the car. On the highways of DDR, the speed limit was 100 km/h, unimaginably slow compared to today – for Germany, that is known for the fun Autobahn experience. When you took your pets, you had to present them to the veterinaries at the border and pay a fee. When you wanted to enter the DDR to visit relatives or friends, you had to pay a fee and change Deutsche Mark into Ostmark. Life was certainly different.

I was six years old, when the wall fell on November 9th 1989. I don’t remember too much anymore. I just remember everyone went nuts. There was a great excitement in the air. My mum went alone, she left us at home on this night. I think it is a pity. I think we would still remember what happened nowadays. But a couple of days after the fall of the wall, we went into East-Berlin to discover it. What I remember: The smell was so different! It smelled like coal, burning coal. The wall must have prevented the smell to come over. And the Trabbies smelled horrific by that time as well. Everything was grey and rundown, compared to today where the eastern parts of Berlin shine so beautiful. You could still see the bullet holes in the walls of many buildings, the holes which date back to WW II.

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We visited Friedrichstadtpalast and witnessed a suite of Tschaikowski, played by the former East-German variete, and we visited the Naturkundemuseum in Mitte. That have been the first two events respectively places I remember in accordance to the re-unification. And today?

Everything seems normal! Berlin is one, no doubt about that. But I still have the feeling it is different when you hit the East German countryside in Brandenburg and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. But it is good that it is like it is and our children will hopefully realize, that times have been different, will hopefully understand, that everyone can be thankful, this never ending cold-war is over, once and for all. What we should learn out of that? Make Love not war, everywhere on this planet. It might be a special case in the history of Germany, with all the guilt, the forgiveness, the separation and finally the re-unification – November 9th is a dark and a glorious date – has both sides in German history and a date which will always be bound to that history. But the principle I address of making love and not war is the same, no matter about what wall we are talking, no matter which religion we believe in and which economic interests are on our list. People have to understand that, finally, once and for all.

And to visualize the celebration of the 25th anniversary of this epic event, I took some pictures, mainly in Mauerpark of the event itself, some close to Bornholmer Brücke and some the days before along Oberbaumbrücke and Eastside Gallery,as well as atBrandenburger Tor, where the rests of the inner Berlin wall can be found. I wrote about the area between Kreuzberg and Friedrichshain – including Eastside Gallery – a couple of month ago and you can find the entry here.

Autumn in Berlin is mostly grey and wet. The colors of the leaves bring some welcome change and when the sun comes out, Berlin offers some most beautiful going places, which you should not miss. In this entry Charlottenburg Castle and the Teufelsberg are presented.

Over the last time lots of reports and pictures of the Alps in autumn colors could be found here. Now it is time for a little round-up from Berlin. The autumn in Berlin is mostly grey and wet, as the winter is. The summer time is certainly the more beautiful time in this city. Still, Berlin is a place with lots of parks and green areas, so you find the autumn colors as well, like in the forests and on the mountains of Austria.

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Schloss Charlottenburg (Charlottenburg Palace) is a beautiful place and every season offers another point of view. In autumn, the many alleys in the park – which is still free of charge – and in Schloss Strasse, leading towards the castle, are colored in yellow from the Tilia trees. Those trees produce an awesome smell in spring, with pale green, new leaves. They offer shadow in summer and in autumn they draw a colorful component into you photos. You should visit the palace, when you got time to do so. In winter, starting from Advent, a great christmas market takes place on the grounds in front of the main building. It’s a beautiful christmas market and besides hot wine you get treats, souvenirs and good food. And if you are first time visitor to this palace, make sure to take the tour. The description, of what you can see, is linked above.

This is the view over Berlin‘s biggest forest, the Grunewald. You will have a great overview from Teufelsberg, a hill built of debris after WW II, today a green oasis with top notch views over the whole city, predominantly former West-Berlin, but at night or when the sight is clear, even deep into former East-Berlin. You will see all the main sights of the city sticking out, a skyline per excellence. The depicted view is towardsWannsee and on the right you can see the Grunewaldturm. This is a classical November depiction, if you are lucky and the sun comes through. It’s certainly beautiful, when it does.

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And this is a forest closeup taken with a 50 – 200 mm objective. It shows the autumn colors in detail. Attached you find the obligatory gallery, with many more pictures of Berlin‘s autumn. Expect another Special later today about the re-unification of Germany, 25 years ago and for next week an entry about the street art you can find on Teufelsberg.

A former border of Berlin, enlighted and in autumn colors

Charlottenburg Palace

Surveillance of the past, Teufelsberg

Grunewald

T-Berg Shining Pt. II

T-Berg Shining, the sun breaks through over Grunewald and illuminates Wannsee and Grunewaldturm

Last weeks report was about Stubai Valley, Hiking along the Innvalley and Lake Obernberg. This week is about two touring areas – with plentiful individual tours – the areas of Sellrain Valley and Isar Ursprung Valley. The Photography give you an impression, what kind of nature is waiting for you to get discovered.

Last weekends Hiking Special Tyrol – Part 1 gave a short introduction in possible tours and regions for supreme hiking, before the winter break and this is why Part 2 already follows this weekend. Innsbruck (Part 1 & Part 2) is a great basis to start your journeys. It is very likely that you will still be able to go some rounds in the late autumn, before the winter reaches the lower valleys. In the meanwhile you can enjoy snow covered summits, awesome weather and green meadows in contrast to those white tips everywhere.

Valley of Sellrain

The Sellrain offers several valleys which terminate into the main valley. If you go up there to the top, you automatically reach the skiing and summer resort Kühtai.

If you leave the valley earlier into one of the several side valleys you will reach a nearly untouched hiking ground, where you can park your car pretty close to the forest. And mostly you reach deep forests, which open up in higher altitudes, where you can find beautiful Almen and granite rocks in the highest altitudes, close to the summits.

The autumn colors have been stunning and a great contrast to the evergreen (or white) meadows of the Stubai Alps. Those are blueberry bushed and their leaves are all colored in red during fall season.

We had a great tour about four weeks ago in the side valley leaving Gries im Sellrain. My Tyrolean friends have a little hut in the mountains and up there, hidden in the forest, you are nearly alone, when you go out in the plains. And that’s the way I celebrated when we reached the summit.

It’s probably a very nice ski touring ground as well – for all recommended entries, have a look here. Make sure to check on the risks for avalanches and enjoy a secluded mountaineering paradise! More pictures can be found in the attached gallery.

Isar Ursprung Valley in Scharnitz

If you have time and it’s earlier in the season, you could surpass the whole first ring of Karwendel and go a tour from Scharnitzto the Achensee close to Jenbach. It is a three day tour, if you plan with about 10 – 20 km trails per day. You walk by Innsbruck, but it’s hidden on the other side of Karwendel, soutwards of you.

This is the view, when you access the valley, in the back the hiking trail spread out and you have several options for great tours. And the following picture is taken inside of the young Isar. It is a pretty cold river, let this be said.

The Isar springs are in the mountains of this region and this river goes all the way up to Munich and passes Bavaria’s capital, as one of Munich‘s sight, since the Isar Auen are a great place for recreation in summer time, for canoeing and all sorts of paddling sports with little boats. We chose a trail towards the Scharnitz Alm, where you can go all the way into the first high valleys of Karwendel, behind Nordkette and soon reached the first deep forest. A beautiful forest, dense and full colored under the influence of Autumn.

But you still find green spots, hidden in the forest. The ground is covered with moss in many parts, the nostrils are filled with an uncomparable smell of nature, when you make your way upwards.

If you make your way deep inside of this fairywonderland, you become hungry. This is our Jause, we enjoyed with an uncomparable view. We met in total maybe 6 people on our tour, which lasted for about 4 hours.

Here you can see the wonderful October colors in contrast to the reddish grey rocks of the big mountains. The water passing through those mountains, eating itself into the rock, has a light turquois color, it is really pure and cold. You find more images attached in the gallery. With the provided information you have something on hand to plan your trip, you should definitively reconsider this, while you are around between May and Mid of November, depending on the weather.

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And when you are on the summits of Nordkette, like the Hafelekar, you have a wonderful look inside of this region as well! These are some views from the Hafelekar and the Hafelekarbahn up to the summit!